What a gorgeous start to 2018 we're getting in the South Island of NZ. With family in the UK, this year's Christmas break has again been a fantastic opportunity to capitalise on most people staying home with the whanau and instead head out into the hills. After a long think about possible destinations we took a firend's advice and headed up to Murchison and then into the Matiri Valley and the 1000-acre plateau for a 4 night trip.
It's always tough trying to second-guess what gear to take on a long trip like this and I rarely get it right.. I 'economised' this time and made do with just two lenses and I'm really glad I didn't take more... it was hard enough making sure we had sufficient ginger wine for NYE...
The landscape up on the plateau is truly magnificent, but the real highlight of the trip for me was on New Year's day morning when a family of weka came to visit us as we prepared for the days' walk... including a completely white weka chick - Leucism, I'm reliably informed (rather than albino, from the colouration in the eye), happens occasionally for random genetic reasons and whilst quite startling, isn't great camouflage for the bird in the long-term!
For those wondering, the two lenses I opted for were the 24mm f/3.5 TS-E and a 100mm f/2.8 macro lens. Both reasonably compact and (relatively) light.